Visioning

I
What do you see in this picture?

 

And in this one?

A shadow and little stream in the first; a beautiful damselfly in the second.

I suspect you did not see this Great Spreadwing in the upper left of the first photo, but I did when I stood there this afternoon. I saw it because of my previous experiences and practiced vision.

II
I recently watched an episode of Morse with a scene in a stately home's picture gallery. On entering, the detective Morse said, "The pictures. Aren't they beautiful?" The gentleman in the room looked around at the paintings, turned, and replied, "Are they? I live here, so I know they're valuable. But I don't know their beauty. I can't see it." "Pity," Morse responded.

III
Keith Woods' refined and moving personal essay reminded me again of the different ways we see and feel depending on unique perspectives. The writer comes to new understanding about his father's complex relationship (and his own) to his "flawed homeland," not always visible to others. 

IV
Even the essay's meaning and beauty were not visible to other commenters to the Facebook post of the essay.

I agree with Morse. Pity.

V 
Aired on and published by NPR, the essay is well worth reading and hearing.

Quite Challenging Indeed!

In answer to a question about cameras, a naturalist in one of my Facebook odonate groups wrote, " Macro photography is quite challenging and takes a lot of time to learn and master."

You got that right, I wanted to write but didn't.

The truth is that I like learning hard things, like my still-feels-new camera and still-newer macro lens. So far, both have outscored me in a contest of skill.

But today's morning foray and some cooperative odes provided a much more successful than usual shoot. I am beginning to think I should just use this lens and forget the other one. I am finally discovering the "sweet spot."

Hiatus Ended with a Day of Bugs

I
Before I even turned off my car in the huge Walmart parking lot, I noticed a hawking Black Saddlebags, high, behind my car. I got out, I watched, and I noticed passersby looking at me, puzzled.

II
Two hours later, I walked down a hospital corridor after a visit. About 15 feet from the doorway, I noticed a Green Darner banging the ceiling light for escape. To the man at the doors, I said, "Dragonfly!" He said, "Yes!" I walked past him, opened the door, and followed the dragonfly outside.

III
Walking into the kitchen to check on dinner, I noticed the orange-red antennae of the largest of two bugs on the deck post. I grabbed a camera and headed out.

IV
On Facebook I posted, "Does this happen to everyone? I drove 18 miles to pick up a prescription at Walmart and before I could open my car door, I saw a Black Saddlebags cruising the lot, hawking. Then I drove those 18 miles home and visited an elderly friend in the hospital. When I walked down the corridor to leave, I saw a Green Darner in the hallway trying to get out. I opened the door and followed him. No pictures. Just a comment. Ever since I started noticing odonates some years ago, I see them everywhere." The first response, from the most famous American ode expert and author, read, "Indeed it does, Robley." Another watcher wrote, "Yes, and I am much happier for those moments."

V
Me too.

Spectacular Occasions

I walk every day, often in the same places. I know these places pretty well: I remember the exact spot where I realized that dragonflies were not just one thing and where I saw my first and only Painted Skimmer and where I collapsed in front of an Arrowhead Spiketail and when I knew that I was obsessed with All Saints' Chapel and the Univeristy Farm Hoophouse, and . . . . But it's more: it's also the first two photographs I took here in Sewanee that reminded me of the good photographs I made as a young adult in North Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana with film cameras.

But then there are spectacular moments, like the one I had today at Abbo's Alley.

I went there only because it was close and I was worried about the weather. I took one of the usual paths and decided to cross a concrete beam (not really a bridge, per se) to peek under one of my favorite bridges. I thought I might get a good shot. Instead, while I looked, I noticed a violently shaking small plant at the edge of the water. I looked and looked and finally lifted my camera (the one fitted with a lens that extends no further than 280mm, alas, and has no auto flash) and looked through the lens. An exuvia! And then a white face! A dragonfly!

I watched some dragonfly (large, I could tell) move work its way with difficulty and determination to another plant, one more open, even closer to the water, with open space for large wings. I studied both banks below me, both quite steep, both completely covered with vegetation. No walking stick, of course. I decided to risk it and crossed back to the path where I started. From across the stream, I could tell I was watching a Gray Petaltail, but the light was so poor and the lens so short that I couldn't really shoot the bug. I crossed over again and sort of slid down the bank as far as I could without falling forward into rocks and stream and watched and snapped (although at an extremely high ISO, so the pictures are grainy in the extreme).

I ran home, looked at the images, adjusted two, uploaded them to my Facebook Southeastern Odes group, and then learned that most group friends had never before seen this ode emerge. The conversation was as enjoyable as the sight.

Some days, like this one, I am reminded of just how lucky I am to have found something I love doing -- taking pictures of things that are hard to photograph and learning everything I can about them and interacting joyfully with like-minded people. May there be other such occasions.

Holy Tamoly Cow!

Sun and Autumn Meadowhawks all over the lake -- warming, mating, ovipositing, resting, and landing on me.

Nothing new there, but this sure is.

Never before have I actually seen the part projected out of the male's pocket. (Hamules hold a female in place during copulation.) When I looked at my photos, I thought I knew what it is, but I posted this photo to my Southeastern Odes group on Facebook for confirmation. Within seconds, Giff Beaton, whose Dragonflies and Damselflies of Georgia and the Southeast is one of my holy books of odonata, replied, "That is a male and it's his hamule . . . "

How many ways can I thank my lucky stars?

     1. sunshine

     2. some good shots

     3. warm earth (good for lying down)

     4. Facebook

     5. and the humorous support of an admired expert.

Kindred Spirits

I truly love my Facebook dragonfly and damselfly groups.

Just this week, an expert, who has written the important books about American odonates, "liked" my post ("It would sure be convenient if American Rubyspots would take in the view anywhere other than in complete shade [necessitatin flashing and weird coloring]. Take a hint from the Blue-ringed Dancers!) And he liked my weird photographs as well. 

I was and am . . . as a former student posted . . . "inodonately happy."

Facebook proves that I am one among many enamored of, challenged by, even obsessed with odonates and odonate photography. I was thrilled to discover Paul Ritchie, fellow amateur and kindred spirit, who, like me, believes the "best photograph will be the next one."

Dragonflies with Paul Ritchie. from AC Wildlife on Vimeo.

Here's to tomorrow and more bugs!

Three Wonderful Posts Made by Other People in One Day

I
Humans of New York posted this today.

Thirty years is mighty impressive.

I have been trying to post every day in this blog for almost six years. It is hard. But harder still if I miss a day.

II
A Facebook friend posted sage advice today found here. I am especially fond of these three of Amitava Kumar's principles:

1. Write every day. This is a cliche, of course, but your will write more when you tell yourself that no day must pass without writing.
2. Have a modest goal. Aim to write 150 words each day.
3. Walk for ten minutes.

III

After I re-posted this article on Facebook, a former student (in 8th, 10th, and 12th grades) wrote, "I still have my journals from your class." (Twenty-three years and counting. I hope she has her words forever.)

Daily Rituals

1.
A fresh morning pot of black tea.

2.
A favorite mug, dolloped with milk first before tea.

3.
Checking in (throughout the day): email, Facebook (and posting -- as a former student said, "You're still teaching," but I think of it as a kind of "book" club in which everyone shares), The New York Times, Feedly.

4.
Reading and commenting on compositions.

5.
Walking.
















6.
Taking pictures.

7.
Looking at, deleting, working on pictures.

8.
Blogging.

9.
A little something before dinner.

10.
Dinner (and sometimes work).

11.
Netflix.

12.
Litter box duties.

13.
Reading.

14.
Bed.

Of these, six are for me for the necessary actions of my creative life, something of which I was reminded today when my friend Jane posted to FB an article from The Washington Post about Mason Currey's book, Daily Rituals: How Artists Work.

His ideas aren't new, and I'm no artist.

But this much is true: "crafting . . . routine[s has] minimize[d] the distractions in [my] life and maximize[d my] ability to think creatively."

Especially the bold ones.

Intersections

I

A former student, from many years ago, sent me a message that said, "You always were interested in advances in all areas. I recall in English class your telling us about black holes and what scientists were learning about them." I don't remember this, but I trust her. I have always wanted to know more, especially about the physical world.

II

In tenth grade, I sometimes spent lunch in the biology lab, not because I had to but because I wanted to. I looked, and looked, and looked at anything I put under the microscope. 

III

A camp friend posted a video on her Facebook today of Tim Minchin, an Australian musician/actor/comedian making a graduation speech. In his life list of "nine life lessons," he told the audience that science and art are not separate: "Science is not a body of knowledge nor belief system. It is just a term which describes humankind's incremental acquisition of understanding through observation. Science is awesome."

IV

Another friend alerted me to a New Yorker article titled "Creativity Creep." Joshua Rothman writes, "This watchful, inner kind of creativity is not about making things but about experiencing life in a creative way; it's a way of asserting your own presence amidst the much larger world of nature, and of finding significance in that wider world. By contrast, our current sense of creativity is almost bound up with the making of stuff. If you have a creative imagination but don't make anything, we regard that as a problem -- we say that you're blocked. . . . Among the many things we lost when we abandoned the Romantic idea of creativity, the most valuable may have been the idea of creativity's stillness. If you're really creative, really imaginative, you don't have to make things. You just have to live, observe, think, and feel. Coleridge, in his poem "Frost at Midnight," uses, as his metaphor for the creative imagination, the frost, which freezes the evening dew into icicles 'quietly shining up at the quiet moon.' The poem begins: 'The Frost performs its secret ministry, / Unhelped by any wind.' The secret, silent, delicate, and temporary work of the frost is creativity, too. It doesn't build, but it transforms. It doesn't last, but it matters."

V

People always ask me two questions: "Do you sell your photographs?" and "Who is the intended audience for your blog?"

I want to answer What does it matter?

What matters is that both transform.

Outside/Inside

I
Outside this happened. Not once. Several times. With sun in between.

On Facebook, I asked, "If the devil is beating his wife when the sun shines during rain, what's he doing when the sun shines during a snowstorm?"

A former student, far more clever and quick-witted than I today, replied, "Maybe she's giving him the cold shoulder?"

II
No cold shoulders inside.

Apprenticeship

When I first started photographing bugs, my friend J would help me on occasion, but she didn't walk with me.

G walked with me, but he didn't know bugs. He did know cameras and photography, so his knowledge came in handy.

Mostly, though I have walked alone, and I have found books on my own, and I  have read them alone, and I have studied my photos alone. As my friend S told me, I have taught myself a lot of biology in the last three years.

But then I found the dragonfly/damselfy groups on Facebook, and now I have companions. What a gold mine!

First, I have felt better about my own knowledge since many others know much much less than I.

Second, I have marveled at the different Odonates folks see in their yards. Those in Florida have enjoyed scads of Halloween Pennants this summer, for example, and I have seen only a few.

Third, a famous person -- Ed Lam -- is a member of the groups, and he is generous with his comments, advice, and support. If someone asks a question, he will answer it. Sometimes he posts his drawings and asks us to ID them. 

Just tonight, I posted that I may have been wrong about photos I put up the other day. Three hours at Lake Dimmick today seriously confused me when I found two totally different looking males of the same species -- the Little Blue Dragonlet. He confirmed that I was right the first time and then gave me specific information I can use in the field.

Both of these dragonflies are Little Blue Dragonlets. They sure look different, don't they?

Nothing, and I mean nothing, beats learning under the tutelage of a master.

About Rain

On Facebook, old friends waxed nostalgic today about memories of our shared summer rains: steady drops popping on the Green River and creek, the smell of damp earth and musty growing things so thick and deep, sitting tucked into a poncho on the ground, the laurels twisted into an embrace above and around.

But the rain here, yesterday and today, brings only pinching melancholy, influenced perhaps by the absence of sharp angles of light to invite my camera. 

Only these, the wild peas sprouting along the Goat Track please me with their teary pink and white satin petals.  Beautiful, yes, but wet and wearing like longing for something of home.  My brother called his daughter, my niece, whom I miss and long to see, "Sweetpea," when she was a child, and it is she I see in these petals: they are beautiful.

School Girls

In the last two weeks, I've been communicating with some women I taught years ago at a girls' school when they themselves were girls. On Facebook we chat and gossip and reminisce and share photos. They are strong women and have maintained strong friendships over a long time now and, in some cases, over great distances.

Just within this week, one daughter of an old friend found me on Facebook. We've exchanged lenthy messages and I've seen pictures of her partner and their two children. She has been a completely unexpected connection made through her discovery of my "friendship" with my niece, whom she had just befriended. I think that the last time I saw her, she was 8. That was at least 25 years ago.

This morning, an old friend called from New York just to check in. She and I met in a summer theatre in 1968 and still check in every now and then to see how the other is doing. I have a few other friends like P, but almost no long-term relationships like the McGehee women I know, even though I went to a girls' school too and even though I was once a girl.

When my sister-in-law of forty-one years died about fifteen months ago, my brother and his children organized a memorial service, or a Celebration of Life as it's called in the Episcopalian church. The day was beautiful -- sunny and warm, with clear skies and fall colors. In the courtyard following the service, I stood, somewhat apart from my brother, niece, and nephew, and greeted folks I know.

Among them were a few girls from my prep school. I'd have known their faces anywhere even though I hadn't seen them in years. Another woman, a bit older than I but who attended the same school, came over, spoke to me, and handed me a copy of a photograph I had forgotten posing for: a group of high school friends, relaxing in and around a swimming pool. I don't remember where we were or why we posed, but I think the photographer was a professional.
One of the girls in the front, wearing the white suit, smiles widely into the sun, eyes closed. The photocopy had been hers. She was a brilliant girl, smart and funny, articulate and idiosyncratic. She went to Smith when most of us stayed in the safe south. I used to see her during vacations, when we were in college and for a few years afterwards. Sometime in our twenties, she changed. Her mother told me she had been in a car wreck and suffered some kind of brain damage. Later I heard she had psychological difficulty. I never learned what happened.

I do know that she stopped visiting me and other friends, gained a lot of weight, and became a recluse, shuttered inside the little house she and her mother had long shared. After her mother died, she stayed in the house and rarely left it. I received the photocopy because Betty, who had become diabetic and suffered greatly, even to the extent of having an amputation, had died a sad and lonely death in that house. The woman who brought me the picture was her neighbor who had been allowed to enter the house after Betty's death. She took the copy especially for me.

Some of us former girls have such unexpected and difficult lives. I take strength from friendships forged among women, and for unexpected connections, I celebrate the social fabric of Facebook.

Facebook

This summer, when I visited my niece and her family in North Carolina, she suggested I join Facebook.

Why, I asked.

Because you connect with old friends, she said.

But I don't want to see what my students are up to, I said.

She said, you'll be sorry. It's great.

So I joined Facebook, and . . .

I can avoid looking at what my students are doing by just not looking at their pages . . .

and I have already connected with many former students from New Orleans. I have seen photos of their weddings and read about babies and upcoming weddings and new jobs and relocations and . . . I love those girls. I mean young women.

And I have missed running into former students and their mothers and fathers at PJ's or Starbucks on Maple Street or at Lebanon's Cafe on Carrollton or at the alum Easter party at McGehee's.

Facebook, as my niece promised, has been a wonderful adventure.

She's a smart cookie.